The "joke" was totally unacceptable. But then again, good staff can be hard/expensive to find/train.

 

Guess that's why the consequences IRL are not what purists think they should be. (And I like to be a purist myself!)

The go around procedure is safe if well practised. But is the airspace ahead clear? Did the controller check that the airspace was clear for a go around before he joked?

Of course the airspace ahead is 'clear'. (Having considered the post below, I have revised my definition of clear to something less definitive) Do you think pilots request clearance before a pilot initiated go around? They just go. There are missed approach procedures for a reason.

 

I would imagine the vast majority of go arounds aren't entirely unexpected. The only time I've experienced one in the back of a liner, it wasn't unexpected from row 18 let alone the PFs seat. (had to laugh at the woman next to me lamenting the lack of communication from the cockpit as we climbed through 5k' enroute to the alternate. My terse response was 'I think she's [PF] a little busy right now.') That's what makes this one more than a little disappointing. Having been in a PFs seat instructed to go around, you don't question - just do. It's like questioning TCAS. That's for later.

Anyone who has been in the military will know exactly what I mean by this statement; there sure a lot of barracks lawyers on this forum. I was so entertained by all the steamy <explitive> being thrown around that I decided to throw my boots on and jump in.

 

First off, these folks here who have experience in the cockpit are trying to convey the message to you that while a go-around is done for safety reasons, it doesn't make it 100% safe. For those of you who believe that logic is "prop wash", I direct you to this NTSB recommendation to the FAA regarding go-arounds and CRO (converging runway operations) http://www.ntsb.gov/doclib/recletters/2013/A-13-024.pdf. I know this report very well considering that my facility had 4 out of the 6 incidents listed. Just because a go-around is done for safety reasons, it doesn't make it SAFE.

 

There are many things that go into air traffic control, this includes how much traffic airspace can handle. With a go-around, you have just introduced an aircraft into the NAS which was not predicted to be there. This means that for example if your arrival rate every 15 minutes is 15 aircraft and that is the max that your airspace can handle, you have just introduced a 16th aircraft oversaturating the airspace. Now you have to figure out where to put this lone aircraft into space that doesn't exists. This can cause issues further out from the actual point of the go-around. How do I know all of this? Well after 10 years of air traffic experience, I've seen this very thing happen more times than I'd like to count and due to these things happening, we track and review every single go-around that happens on a daily basis.

 

Oh, and to the person who said that a go-around is only done to prevent an accident a few posts ago, you are flat out wrong and I'll give you am example. My runway is 10,000 ft long, aircraft A (B777) lands and turns off at the high speed exit 8,000 ft down the runway. The aircraft clears the runway surface, but their rear wheels haven't fully crossed over the hold bars and the aircraft is slowly moving forward. Aircraft B (B737) is on final approach and about to cross the landing threshold. If aircraft A still doesn't have their wheels across the hold bars before aircraft B crosses the threshold, I cannot allow aircraft B to land. Even though there is no possible way these two aircraft would ever hit, there is a rule that tells me I cannot allow that aircraft to land. This in turn results in a go-around,not for safety reasons, but because I don't want to have a deal.

 

To all those that say this controller should be hung out to dry. While I fully agree that this was a show of unprofessionalism and carelessness, a loss of employment may not be so straight forward. I don't like the fact that this person may still have a job as it clearly makes my profession look bad, but I have seen worse without such actions taken. Now since this hit the media they may be inclined to take aggressive action, but it will most likely result in a transfer....remember all the sleepy controllers????

 

Dear pilots of this forum, most of us (ATC's) do understand that a go-around is not safe and we do everything we can to prevent them.

 

Rant over...

Anyone who has been in the military will know exactly what I mean by this statement; there sure a lot of barracks lawyers on this forum. I was so entertained by all the steamy <explitive> being thrown around that I decided to throw my boots on and jump in.

 

First off, these folks here who have experience in the cockpit are trying to convey the message to you that while a go-around is done for safety reasons, it doesn't make it 100% safe. For those of you who believe that logic is "prop wash", I direct you to this NTSB recommendation to the FAA regarding go-arounds and CRO (converging runway operations) http://www.ntsb.gov/doclib/recletters/2013/A-13-024.pdf. I know this report very well considering that my facility had 4 out of the 6 incidents listed. Just because a go-around is done for safety reasons, it doesn't make it SAFE.

 

Oh, and to the person who said that a go-around is only done to prevent an accident a few posts ago, you are flat out wrong and I'll give you am example. My runway is 10,000 ft long, aircraft A (B777) lands and turns off at the high speed exit 8,000 ft down the runway. The aircraft clears the runway surface, but their rear wheels haven't fully crossed over the hold bars and the aircraft is slowly moving forward. Aircraft B (B737) is on final approach and about to cross the landing threshold. If aircraft A still doesn't have their wheels across the hold bars before aircraft B crosses the threshold, I cannot allow aircraft B to land. Even though there is no possible way these two aircraft would ever hit, there is a rule that tells me I cannot allow that aircraft to land. This in turn results in a go-around,not for safety reasons, but because I don't want to have a deal.

 

Rant over...

A go-around because of traffic on the runway is definitely one for a safety reason. How do you know that aircraft on the runway is not going to blow a tire or put a main in the grass while turning off and end up stopped directly in the path of the plane that just touched down behind it? There are reasons why if you didn't send the plane around, you would get a deal.

 

Nothing about flying is going to be 100% safe, but a go around is not unsafe for the act of changing from a landing descent to a climb, as some people here seem to think. There is plenty to be argued for an entirely unsafe day. The being too close to the traffic in front, the unstabilized approach, the windshear on final, the no contact at minimums, the burning into the reserves after the go around and holding, the extra flying time spent in the weather, etc etc. All of that is less than 100% safe and part of the go around event, but the adding of GA thrust, the pressing of the toga buttons, the pitching of the aircraft up into the climb, and the retraction of the landing gear, though making more noise and possibly involving some unexpected bodily sensations to you back in row 18 may seem dramatic and dangerous, it really is not as dangerous as some here think. Everything that may have lead to that event a minute ago and the circling around in the thunderstorm for the next twenty minutes though, was probably quite a bit more dangerous than the go around.

I direct you to this NTSB recommendation to the FAA regarding go-arounds and CRO

I see the NTSB used a quote from the AFH in the pdf link you posted...

 

 

The FAA’s Airplane Flying Handbook, FAA-H-8083-3A, chapter 8, “Approaches and Landings,” states the following: “Whenever landing conditions are not satisfactory, a go-around is warranted. There are many factors that can contribute to unsatisfactory landing conditions. Situations such as air traffic control [ATC] requirements, unexpected appearance of hazards on the runway, overtaking another airplane, wind shear, wake turbulence, mechanical failure and/or an unstabilized approach are all examples of reasons to discontinue a landing approach and make another approach under more favorable conditions.…The go-around is not strictly an emergency procedure. It is a normal maneuver that may at times be used in an emergency situation.…Although the need to discontinue a landing may arise at any point in the landing process, the most critical go-around will be one started when very close to the ground. Therefore, the earlier a condition that warrants a go-around is recognized, the safer the go-around/rejected landing will be.”

 

A go-around may be directed by ATC or initiated by the pilot. The flight crew does not need permission from ATC to execute the maneuver.

 

Exactly how I view a Go-Around... a normal maneuver.  And like any other flight maneuver one might be called upon to use (especially one as common as a Go-Around) the operator needs to be proficient at it.

 

---------------

Oh my... a couple of more things from the Airplane Flying Handbook I can add here:

 

 

•The flight instructor should emphasize early on (which we do) and the student pilot should be made to understand, that the go-around maneuver is an alternative to any approach and/or landing.

 

•The go-around maneuver is not inherently dangerous in itself. It becomes dangerous only when delayed unduly or executed improperly.

This ATC controller will likely get "negligent" rather than "intentional" disruption to service. Intentional means that he is trying to undermine or sabotage Delta Airlines (by making their fuel costs go higher, or intentionally trying to cause harm). He did not do such a thing, and no defence attorney will let that stand.

 

Negligence? yes. He made a joke which caused a reportable incident which would not have happened without his joke. His joke was poorly constructed and should never have carried a concise instruction such as "Go around". He should have given the post-landing instruction first (ie addressed the pilots enquiry first) and maybe joked afterward.

 

Here is a joke in the same vein that would probably have avoided the problem.

• "After landing, vacate onto taxiway abc and await further instructions from ground... or you could go around if you want to and come back later? lol".

 

So what do you do with an employee that just cost a client thousands of dollars due to negligence?

Depends on how well staffed you are, and how much you like the employee... and how much you're willing to bet they don't win an unfair dismissal payout if they take it to court/employee tribunal/whatever they have in America that does that kind of stuff.

 

If management decide they like this employee, and are satisfied that he isn't a loose cannon likely to offend again, they might chuck him back into some training, cut his pay for a bit, demote him, whatever. That way they get to keep the staffing levels up and save stacks of money.

 

If the FAA takes away his ATC licence, then you can put him in management, and get one of the existing management to go back to an ATC role (assuming they have ATC management with active licences, or licences that can be re-activated quickly).

 

If they don't like him, they can sack him over this, and depending on how many times he has done this kind of thing before, and if there is a record of same, then there is some likelihood that the unfair dismissal issue may be mitigated.

 

If it's the first time he has done this (and not having a detailed record of previous events is the same thing), and if the FAA don't take his licence away outright... and if the ATC contractor then sacks him outright anyway... then the controller has 1: lost his job and 2: just won a bunch of money in court settlements (which the ATC contractor will need to pay - and then they are down 1 staff member and need to recruit/train more - which costs more).

This ATC controller will likely get "negligent" rather than "intentional" disruption to service.

 

Not to mention if the airline made a complaint or passengers come to that who missed onward connnections or appointments that ordinarily could not have been avoided had it not been done for a joke!